Thin Dark Chocolate Almond Snacking Bark

Exciting news today since I’m going on vacation exploring the American Southwest and Utah’s beautiful National Parks. I will be hiking a lot, so a snack such as these thin dark chocolate almond snacking barks will be perfect!

This time, vacations will be all about nature, and to make the experience even more complete, we decided to go camping! We never did that together and it’s been years since I’ve been doing camping myself, so it is quite an adventure. I just hope I won’t be freezing during the night (temperatures should be below 30F sometimes!!), but in case of emergency we still have the car to sleep in.

With this new project in mind, David and I went to the hiking supply to be well equipped. The first thing to purchase was of course the tent, and a full hiking and camping gear, since we left almost everything we had behind us in Europe. By walking around in the store, I passed several times in front of a snack stand offering various healthy snacks that you can bring with you when hiking. Among them, I saw these tiny chocolate almond barks with sea salt “Thins” that I had never seen before. They looked fantastic: flavorful, thin and crispy, and made with a few ingredients only.

Since then, I have been purchasing some of these snacks on my way to see the Wizard of Oz in an outdoor cinema (I won’t be asking you if you already saw it because I am pretty sure you did hundred of times – but for me it was the first time!). They convinced me. These chocolate barks are a very simple snack consisting of natural ingredients only, and it’s quite energetic thanks to the almonds (my precious). The only down to this snack was the price: quite expensive for only a few of them to grab in the package.

It gave me a good reason to try to bake them myself (I had already the idea in mind even before I tried them I admit). Homemade snacks are the best we can have. We often think that the so-called healthy snacks we find in the grocery store are good for us while they actually contain many additives as well as far too much sugar and unhealthy fats. Again, nothing is worth a homemade snack, which often doesn’t take so much time to prepare and can be stored for days in a air-tight container.

I made these thin dark chocolate almond barks my own way, trying to stick to a very few ingredients only. I used unsweetened dark chocolate here to have a better control of the sugar I would use in the recipe, and also because sweetened chocolate always add some unnecessary ingredients while we think it’s chocolate only. However, you could also try with 70% dark chocolate and adjust the quantity of agave syrup (or honey, or maple syrup), it will work very well too.

In total, it’s only 3 ingredients and a pinch of sea salt, for a recipe packed with health benefits that will take you 10 minutes to prepare only. Both chocolate and almonds are a good source of magnesium, while almonds are energetic, packed with antioxidants, and will bring you a great amount of calcium, vitamin E and dietary fibers. And please don’t be scared by their high quantity of fats, since they actually contain the heart-healthy monounsaturated fat.

I have several other healthy snacks I will bring with me while hiking, such as my Healthy no-bake energy bites (I absolutely love them), and also my Raw Spicy Lime Bites for a sweet and tangy twist. Well, I think I am now ready for hiking and camping, exploring the wild american landscapes nature offers in the Southwest region. You are welcome to follow my adventures on Instagram, where I will be sharing some updates on My Story from time to time. And please, if you have any tips or recommendations, feel free to share them with me in comments below or by email, it will be much appreciated. Have a good day everyone!